[Cialug] changing linux source code

[Nathan Stien]

On 4/20/07, Cooper, Aaron L. <alcooper1 at dmacc.edu> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm a programming student and was wondering if anyone know's of any books (free or otherwise) about how to modify linux's source code.  I probally won't be trying it for a few terms but sometime I think it'd be fun to try.

There's a wealth of howtos and freely available information about this
out on the web.  That's pretty much how everyone learns it.  Just
google "linux kernel howto" or similar.

If you really like your information to come on dead trees, I really
enjoyed this book:
"Understanding the Linux Kernel"
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/understandlk/
It's quite a brick.  Covers the structure of the kernel and quite a
lot of details.  It's fairly i386-centric, but hey, so is the rest of
the world.

I also have this lovely bundle of dead trees, which focuses on driver
development:
"Linux Device Drivers"
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/linuxdrive3/
This one is good because you develop a series of real device drivers
if you work through the examples.  The drivers don't, you know, *do
anything* really, but it's very instructive to get hands-on experience
working with the driver framework, handling kobjects, sysfs, and all
that good stuff.

Here's a pdf of a nice little book about how to build linux kernels
with various configurations:
"Linux Kernel in a Nutshell"
http://www.kroah.com/lkn/
You could also buy it if you want to support the author (he's a pretty
interesting guy).

Kernel-level hacking can hose a system like nothing else on earth, so
I suggest you do this first on a machine you don't care about, or at
least one you've got backups of.  Better yet, do it in a virtual
machine or with User Mode Linux.

-- 
Nathan P. Stien
Consulting Engineer / Software Developer
Embedded Systems Electronics and Software
http://linkedin.com/in/nathanstien
Mobile: 309.241.2581